Earthquake hits Sumatra
What do you get when you live in an earthquake zone? Earthquakes!!! Indonesia had a big one today in west Sumatra and according to the BBC, 70 people are dead. Its kind of like when people who live in a flood plain, complain about getting flooded, its only a matter of time.
In the past I have voiced my oppostion to big ugly grey cement buildings being built in Bali. They are ugly and dangerous, as an earthquake will damage most of them. After living on the west coast of the US, where all the buildings are either made of wood, or have a wood frame, I find it amazing that people in Bali, including ‘bules‘ build houses out of concrete and bricks. Its a receipe for disaster that will be cooked more often as global warming combines with denser populations.
As far as I know there is no damage in Bali, but Bali will get its turn sometime in the future. Let’s hope building methods improve and this kind of event is reduced to an inconvenience.
By Nick | Permalink
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Comments
Kiwis seem to be able to build brick and concrete structures to withstand substantial ’shakes’. It probably comes back to construction cost and also the severity of the quake.
MH
Building and choice of materials is a difficult and complex topic. If we all built wood houses, there would be very few trees available. Agreed that in an earthquake zone, construction practices should focus on preserving the building during such events to minimise fatalities and destruction.
Who knows..Maybe cost has something to do with it. As we all know the average Indonesian is wealthy beyond comprehension and I can’t really understand why they don’t build their buildings out of the best and most expensive materials available either. It is my hope that one day they will stop putting their fortunes in their individual off shore accounts and start building their houses out of timber coz god knows we don’t need the trees to stay in the ground.
Maybe then they could also get proper tradesmen in to build their houses because that’s the way the west does it and that would surely cut down the death rate.
thanks for the news ,,great blogs.. boy just heard now that another airplane crashed in jog ja today ,,whats up with indo aviation safety,,garuda plane with 140 pass 90 saved up till now 2pm aus std time .. i fly to bali evary 3 mths with garuda’ mayee not any more///
evan